World Consumed More of Every Main Fuel (Except One) Than In Any Previous Year -- Guess Which Fuel?

Link here.

Not since 1973 has world energy use increased by as much, in percentage terms, as it did in 2010. According to BP’s annual Statistical Review of World Energy, published today, 2010’s energy consumption was up by 5.6% on the year before. In part this is thanks to recovery from the economic crisis; in part it is down to the longer-term shift in economic activity towards emerging economies, which are less efficient in their energy use.

Robust growth was seen in all regions and in almost all types of energy use: the world consumed more of every main fuel bar one than it had in any previous year.

Consumption of oil, which accounts for 34% of the world’s primary energy by BP’s calculations, rose by 3.1%. Coal, at 30% the number two fuel, was up by 7.6%, growing faster than at any time since 2003. Consumption of gas, which contributes 24%, was up by 7.4%, the biggest annual growth since 1984.

The laggard:

Of all the fuels, only nuclear had seen better years; 2% growth over 2009 still left it a little below its levels in 2005 and 2006. Ten years ago nuclear and hydro were pretty evenly pegged as energy providers; last year hydro provided 20% more electricity. After the disaster at Fukushima, with its attendant closure of a lot of Japanese and German nuclear capacity, nuclear will undoubtedly fall further behind still.

Hey, how about renewables?

That said, non-hydro renewables still check in at only 1.3% of global energy consumption—1.8% if you include biofuels. (Hydro accounted for 6.5%, also another record.)

Did Steven Chu "see" the Japanese nuclear disaster coming?

It now makes sense to me why a nuclear physicist would say his worse nightmare is coal. Like many brilliant men, he thinks of derivatives or "unintended consequences." As a nuclear physicist Chu realized that a nuclear meltdown was inevitable (earthquakes, human error, poor designs, terrorists, anarchy). If the world reacted to a nuclear meltdown as Germany has, Chu understood that the only fuel that could make up the difference was coal. In 2010, coal saw the greatest increase in consumption since 2003 and that was before the nuclear disaster in Japan. I now get it. Steven Chu was absolutely correct. His greatest nightmare is "coal."